After seven days of harvest in the state, the results are coming in across the map.
According to the Kansas Wheat Commission, Monday’s harvest report is a tale of the widely varying growing conditions across the state, from abandoned acres in drought-afflicted southwest Kansas to ample moisture and good yields in the southeast.
There is some good news in the middle, too.
Better than half of the state’s 105 counties have combines in the field as harvest approaches mid-week. By Tuesday, 63 counties were engaged in hauling wheat to the bin.
Bryan Moser at the Great Bend Co-op said Tuesday afternoon that the harvest in Barton County is a mixed bag of results. “We’ve had protein testing all over and yields all over.” While mostly yields were down, there were some loads taken in as high as 72 bushels per acre with a low of around 18. “It’s showing as a pretty good protein crop,” Moser noted, adding that recent rains were too late for yields but helped out protein numbers as cool conditions helped fill out wheat heads.
Harvest in Barton County is a little shy of halfway, as Great Bend’s 11 locations continue to take in loads, Moser said.
Meanwhile, In central Kansas, yields are coming in ranging from 25 to 55 bushels per acre.
In neighboring Rice County, Tony Andrews from Lyons reported test weights of 60 pounds per bushel and above. He expects his farm to average 25 to 30 bushels per acre. Andrews said the rains didn’t come into the area until too late.
At that point, it just kept them out of the fields. They expect harvest to wrap up for their operation on Wednesday. Andrews farms with his in-laws, and they hired a custom harvester crew from Nebraska, that is looking for another job starting on Thursday.
With lower yields across the region and increased price of fuel, many custom harvest crews have been on the lookout for acres to cut.
Also, Brian Sieker from Chase reported test weights ranging from 59-64 pounds per bushel. He reports that the AgriPro variety Bob Dole held on pretty well in his sandy soil. Since Sieker has an after-market parts sales business, he tests out products before he sells them.
To help his customers make good choices on things they might use or need based on their unique situation, he is trying out a feature for grain headers to help harvest short wheat.
Soft red wheat results
In eastern Kansas, soft red winter wheat harvest is just getting started. Combines started to roll on SRW in Crawford County the middle of last week. It’s too early to report many yields and quality thus far is a bit hit-and-miss, according to Brice Elnicki, general manager/CEO of Producers Coop Association in Girard.
The growing season in this far southeastern part of the state differs greatly from wheat production further west. Here, the area typically receives adequate moisture over the winter and doesn’t have winterkill issues.
Generally, the local SRW wheat crop receives adequate rainfall — which is why producers plant soft wheat varieties with disease tolerance packages, rather than the drought-tolerant hard wheat varieties planted further west.
Elnicki explained producers want a dry end of May and start of June to head off quality concerns like sprouting. Good yields come in at 80 bushels per acre, 100-bushel wheat is very good and 110 to 120 bushels per acre is “darn good.” Harvested SRW wheat will be marketed to domestic flour mills in the Kansas City area.
This year’s growing season was good, but a little wetter than producers would prefer. The weather dried out in the last two to three weeks, which removed pre-harvest quality concerns, he said.
Early yields are coming in between 80 to 100 bushels an acre, not a chart-topper, but good results. Average test weight is 60.8 pounds per bushel and moisture is 12.3 percent.
While the majority of wheat growers in the area did spray fungicide, the ones that did not are seeing low incidence of vomitoxin, with less than 15 percent of fields affected, Elnicki reported.
Nearly all of the SRW wheat acres in the area will be double-cropped to soybeans, but Elnicki said area producers are waiting for rain later on this week before they get started.
